Nova Scotia’s crime severity index number also dropped by nine per cent, according to the figures.

The overall crime rate dropped in Halifax by 10 per cent, which exceeds the national number of eight per cent.

The numbers are all based on police-reported crime statistics. According to the Stats Can website, the crime severity index (CSI) measures the volume and severity of crimes.

To calculate the CSI, the agency assigns a “weight based on the average sentence handed down by criminal courts” for offences. Data is drawn from the Uniform Crime Reporting Survey, which is a census of crime known to and substantiated by police services.

To simplify comparisons, the CSI is standardized on a base year (it was 2006) which was assigned the value of 100.

The Ontario city of Barrie recorded the lowest crime severity index for metropolitain areas in 2013, with a rate of 42 per 100,000 population.

Regina had Canada’s highest with 109.

The national tally was 68.7, slightly higher than Halifax’s number of 68.6.

Vancouver scored 90.3, Toronto had 47.1 and Moncton tallied 66.1.

Every metropolitan area had a drop in the CSI except Edmonton, which stayed even. Victoria had the largest drop at 17 per cent.

Nova Scotia had a slightly higher CSI (69.8) than Halifax.

Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia and the three territories had higher CSIs than Nova Scotia.

The release said Canada recorded 1.8 million criminal incidents in 2013, a drop of 132,000 from 2012.

Most of the drop is attributed to declining numbers of break and enters and robberies.

Increases in some crimes were recorded. Those include extortion, child pornography, aggravated sexual assault, sexual violations against children and identity theft.

Nationally, there were 505 homicides in 2013 compared to 467 the year before.

Halifax had 12 homicides in 2012, six last year and there have been four so far in 2014.

Stats Can also collects self-reported victimization data and does a general social survey on victimization every five years. The 2014 victimization survey is currently underway.